One of the things I have continuously suggested is that before doing any practical magick you should perform a divination. For example, should you perform a magickal ritual today to get a new job?

Well, if you’re unhappy with a current job, it would seem like this is a no-brainer. Why bother doing a divination? Well, it might be that your magick to get the new job is successful but the new company closes in a couple of months while the old company was about to offer you a better position that would have resolved all of your problems. A divination would give you insight into whether or not to stay with the current job or go for something else.

Fate or Free Will?

This seems to imply that a divination can see what you are fated to experience and that the only free will you might have is the ability to encourage or slow what must happen at worst, or have a choice between limited possibilities at best. I have to disagree with this interpretation. I would be more inclined to say that you have a choice between being a “victim” of karma (in the Kabalah it’s called “Tee-koon”) or being the master of your life.

Most people who know of karma have a misunderstanding of it due to Western oversimplifications. Karma is not fate. It is not punishments and rewards. At its essence it is a type of universal educational system. As a result of your actions (not your intentions) there are things you must learn in order to spiritually evolve. Sometime, learning can be painful. For example, if you put your hand in a flame, you painfully learn that flames are hot and will burn you. However, it is not the purpose of a fireÂ to burn you. The lesson is painful, but it was not a punishment. There are many ways you could learn that fire is hot and can burn. You can learn the lesson without burning yourself or you can get burned. If you don’t learn the lesson it is likely that you will get burned again and again until you do learn the lesson that fire is hot.

Karma is like that. You can experience the same thing, over and over (sometimes called “re-scripting”) or you can learn your lesson and move on. So let’s say that a person is poor. He or she may choose to remain poor (“It’s my karma to be poor and I can’t escape it” or “It’s my fate to be poor”) or that person can work to discover the lesson they need to learn from poverty. Once the lesson is learned they do not have to remain poor. Metaphorically, they don’t have to keep putting their hand in the fire once they learn that fire is hot.

We each have this choice. Most people are victims of what they call “bad luck,” “fate,” or something similar. They simply don’t know that they have a choice and can move on. Magickal people know they have a choice and can choose to move on. That’s where a divination such as working with Tarot cards comes in.

The Divination Snapshot

A divination simply takes a snapshot of what is going on right now. If you perform a divination before a magick ritual it will tell you what you are headed for if you perform the magickÂ at this moment. It can indicate influences (including karma) that you might not be aware of. It provides additional information. I read on one forum where a person wrote that a divination is like a doctor saying, “Hmmm. You smoke. If you continue you will likely get emphysema, heart disease, or lung cancer.” You are free to choose to smoke more, smoke the same, smoke less, or quit smoking. You have free will. The doctor gave you a divination of your future, but you are free to encourage or discourage it. It’s free will, not fate.

So before performing a practical magick ritual, do a divination. If it shows that the outcome will be positive, go ahead and perform the ritual. If it indicates that the result will not be as positive as you’d like, or actually negative, change the goal of your ritual and do another divination. In this way you can discover the best magick you can do at any particular time. You can use a divination snapshot to give you information that can guide your choices. It allows you to choose what you want and use your free will rather than being a victim of some imaginary fate.